Happy Halloween!

It is scary how much I love this holiday. I used to say it is because Halloween falls in my birthday
month but I think there are the other elements involved - I love the colors associated with Halloween, the spooky fun movies, and what little girl doesn't love to dress up???
As soon as the Maui Marathon was over darling daughter and I put on our festive hats and started decorating our house for October. Some of our window decals are fitting enough that we can keep them up through Thanksgiving. That is a win-win in terms of getting to enjoy the pumpkins more but it also keeps the birds from flying into our one large window. That didn't end well months and months ago and we have kept things in the windows ever since. Thank goodness for good friends who will come remove the deadly evidence after I left to take darling daughter to school.
But onto traditions and fun since that is what holidays are all about! I truly do cherish traditions especially now that I am so far away from the rest of my family. I remember what we did on Halloween and am striving to make great memories from darling daughter even if they are different from my childhood memories.
One tradition that is already firmly planted - picking out our pumpkin! Well, pumpkins. One to carve and a couple for me to transform into pumpkin puree yumminess! We also roast all of the pumpkin seeds since we love them that much. What a wonderful time of year and yes, home roasted seeds are so much better than store bought. To select our pumpkin we go to a local farm and wander the pumpkin patch until we find the pumpkins that call our name out. They also have a fun corn maze that we did and have some yummies to buy. We don't go all out with the food but I did let darling daughter get an old fashioned candy stick mainly because it brought back warm memories of when I savored those wonderful treats. Although she poo-poo'ed my favorite flavor - root beer. Why didn't I get one for me?
Another tradition is a Halloween cake. My mom used to do a chocolate cake with marshmallow topping. I tried to get the tradition of a chocolate cake with peanut butter chocolate icing set but my family is not loving the peanut butter. So instead, darling daughter gets to pick out what she wants to do each year and it doesn't have to be the same. This year we made a marble cake with just a drizzle of icing on top. I gave her a reasonable amount of candy corn to decorate the cake with and it is beautiful. Unfortunately, we began digging into the cake before I could take a picture.
In our neck of the woods we don't have trick or treaters coming to our house so that makes it easy for me to resist buying all the Halloween treats. Add in that I am not doing dairy and the treat list shrinks some more. In fact, I only bought that one bag of candy corn and in all reality, I may toss it before it is finished. No one will know. We really wanted Halloween shaped sugar cake toppings but we couldn't find them. But I am losing focus....trick or treating. We do take darling daughter. In past years we went to our old neighborhood. I knew the people, the neighborhood was festive, it seemed right. This year we will be trying something different - the local mall is having an event that some stores are participating in and I really like the idea of that! Fingers crossed darling daughter enjoys it too.
But Halloween isn't just about Halloween night. We went to a family fun night at her school last week and had to carve another pumpkin (well, we wanted to!), her school is having a parade today (so sad I will miss it), and we have been enjoying Curious George A Halloween Boo Fest for a couple of nights. Oh how I love that monkey? And how cool is it that the Man in the Yellow Hat is a marathoner? And what about the female science genius? Just saying....
I truly hope you have a BOO-tiful day and a GHOULISHLY wonderful Halloween!
Daily Gratitude: I am thankful for Curious George.
Daily Affirmation: I am in touch with my inner youth!